Star shaped conveyor for feeding or discharging empty plastics containers or bottles to or from a machine and orienting and aligning machine having said star-shaped conveyor

ABSTRACT

The invention refers to the field of systems for conveying empty plastics bottles and more precisely to a star-shaped conveyor adapted to feed or discharge empty bottles to or from an operative machine. Preferably, but not exclusively, the machine which the star-shaped conveyor is connected to, is a machine for orienting and aligning empty plastics bottles or containers. The star-shaped conveyor is provided with a plurality of recesses ( 4 ), a negative pressure is established in each recess for an arc between 90° and 180°, the arc starts in correspondence of a machine and ends in correspondence of a conveyor ( 7 ) for transferring the bottles to a filling apparatus or to feed a bottle processing machine.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This is a continuation application of U.S. Ser. No. 10/541,398, filedJul. 1, 2005, which is the U.S. National Phase of PCT/EP2004/00508,filed Jan. 22, 2004, which in turn claims priority to Italianapplication no. PR2003 A 000013, filed Feb. 19, 2003, all of which areincorporated by reference in their entirety.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to a star-shaped conveyor for feeding ordischarging empty plastics containers or bottles to or from a machineand an aligning and orienting machine comprising said star-shapedconveyor.

A star-shaped conveyor is a conveyor comprising a disk rotating aroundits vertical axis, a plurality of regularly or not regularly spacedapart recesses or indentations are formed in its periphery, theseindentations or recesses are adapted to receive and transfer emptybottles to a machine and from a bottle processing machine, e.g. arinsing machine or an orienting and aligning machine.

The star-shaped conveyor which supplies/takes bottles to/from the bottleprocessing machine, must be perfectly synchronized with the same machinein order to avoid jamming.

According to the present needs, all of the empty bottle processingmachines must process bottles of different shapes or bottles having thesame shape but different capacity.

As the shape is changed, the prior art star-shaped conveyors must besubjected to complex mechanical modifications, and sometimes it is evennecessary to change also the shape and the pitch of the recesses definedin the star-shaped conveyor.

Extremely complicate star-shaped conveyors having changeableindentations are known, which require time-consuming adjustments andconsequently long downtimes whenever the bottle size is changed.

The object of the present invention is to implement a star-shapedconveyor designed to transport bottles of varying sizes or capacitieswithout changing the recess shape.

Another object is to simplify the operation of discharging the emptybottles even the deformed ones. These and other objects will be achievedby a star-shaped conveyor for feeding or discharging empty plasticscontainers or bottles to or from a machine and an orienting and aligningmachine including said star-shaped conveyor, object of the presentinvention, which are characterized by the attached claims.

These and other characteristics will be better understood by thefollowing description, given only in a non limiting illustrative way, ofa preferred embodiment shown in the attached drawings, wherein:

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of the star-shaped conveyor partiallysectioned to show some details,

FIG. 2 is a perspective view of a sucking apparatus mounted to thestar-shaped conveyor,

FIG. 3 is a perspective view of a vacuum source 10 located under thestar-shaped conveyor,

FIG. 4 is a perspective view of the star-shaped conveyor mounted to amachine for orienting and aligning empty plastics bottles,

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Referring to FIG. 1, reference number 1 generally shows a star-shapedconveyor formed by two circular plates 2, 3, defining along theirperipheries indentations or recesses 4 adapted to receive bottles 6coming, in the example shown, from a machine 5 for orienting andaligning empty plastics bottles 6.

The bottles exiting said machine are transferred on a mechanical orpneumatic conveyor 7 which transports them to a filling apparatus.

Box elements 8 are sandwiched the two plates 2, 3. Each box-element hasa face 10 shaped to perfectly follow the curvilinear outline of therecesses 4 and formed in dependence on the biggest bottles. A verticalopening 9 is defined in each face 10.

The lower face of each box element 8 is opened and abuts the lower plate2 in correspondence of horizontal openings 11.

Openings 11 are defined along a circumference and overlap an underlyingslot 12 defined in a surface 13 of a cylindrical chamber 14 in whichthere is a negative pressure.

Slot 12 span an arc varying from 90.degree. to 180.degree.

The vertical opening or slot 9 of each box element 8 must have a widththat assures a contact with a bottle having the lowest diameter that thestar-shaped conveyor can process, in this way it is possible to processevery bottle having a greater diameter obviously up to the maximum limitdetermined by the recess depth and cross-section. The star-shapedconveyor is rotatively driven by known and not illustrated driving meanswhich are independent or connected to a machine which the conveyor isconnected to.

The operation of the star-shaped conveyor will follow.

All of the box elements located on the slot 12 are connected to thecylindrical chamber 14 from which air is sucked by the fan, in this wayevery container which will come in front of the above mentioned slotswill be sucked and hold in the recess until the box element will departfrom the slot 12.

In the shown example, the bottles will be held for a 180.degree. arc,anyway by extending or shortening the arc it will be possible to changethe bottle discharge position with respect to the take up position.

To this end, it is provided a sliding door (not shown) to reduce theworking arc of said slot and consequently change the angular dischargeposition.

In addition, the star-shaped conveyor is also rotated around itsvertical axis by driving means which are not expressly described andshown, said driving means can be independent or dependent on the machinefor introducing or taking bottles which the conveyor is connected to.

As it is shown in FIGS. 2, 3 and 4, the star-shaped conveyor can bepreferably but not exclusively applied in a machine for orienting andaligning bulk bottles received in a cylindrical container of saidmachine.

As a matter of fact, the latest models of said machines must be capableto process different types of containers particularly of differentcapacity such as the mineral water filling apparatus which must processbottles of half liter to two liters.

Said machines, such as the machine described in the Italian patent N.1287097, are provided with two or more discharge locations forincreasing their productivity and require a carousel 20 carrying aplurality of spacers 21 forming a number of channels which is multipleof a number of the funnel discharge channels minus one.

The discharge channel, not shown, are located above the spacers and theyare carried by a cylindrical wall which rotates around a vertical axisat a speed different from that of the carousel 20 carrying the spacers.

Therefore it is necessary a star-shaped conveyor for picking up thebottles from the spacers and transporting them along a predetermineddirection; by means of two star-shaped conveyors and keeping unchangedthe rotation direction of the aligning machine, it is possible to feedbottles along a direction opposite to that shown in figures.

Applying the star-shaped conveyor which holds bottles by a negativepressure attached to an aligning machine it is possible to obtainseveral advantages, among them:

the shape of the spacers and/or discharge channels is simplified.

It is possible to get rid off a bottle sliding surface because bottlestravel hanging and held by their bodies.

It is possible to get rid off the devices for extracting defective andcrushed bottles.

The above described star-shaped conveyor can be applied at the exit of arinsing machine, wherein an incorrect synchronization of the star-shapedconveyor with the machine can break the bottles.

For making easier the insertion of the bottles by the pneumatic conveyor7 according to bottle size change, the conveyor can be provided withmeans for rising or lowering it, or the star-shaped conveyor, which canhave and independent driving means or dependent on the machine which isconnected to, must be capable of moving vertically.

The star-shaped conveyor can be rotated by driving a slotted shaftwhich, in turn, rotates a sleeve coupled to said slotted shaft, which inturn rotates said star-shaped conveyor.

The cylindrical stationary chamber must also obviously follow thevertical motion of the star-shaped conveyor.

1. Star-shaped conveyor for transporting or taking out empty plasticscontainers or bottles to or from a machine of a type comprising aplurality of indentations (4) uniformly distributed along the peripheryof two spaced apart plates (2 and 3), characterized by the fact vacuumis provided in each indentation capable of holding the empty bottletightly against the indentation surface for a predeterminedcircumferential arc.
 2. Star-shaped conveyor according to claim 1characterized by the fact each indentation is provided with a boxelement supported by the lower plate (2) defining openings (11), thenumber of openings (11) being equal to the number of indentations,openings (11) are arranged along a circumference overlaying a slot (12)defined on a cylindrical chamber (14) in which vacuum is created, eachbox element has a vertical opening (9) made in one (10) of its faceswhich follows the curvilinear profile of the indentation.
 3. Star-shapedconveyor according to claim 2, characterized by the fact the slot (12)extends along an arc comprised between 90° degree and 180° degreestarting from the discharge of an operative machine to the inlet of aconveyor for transporting bottles.
 4. Machine for aligning and orientingplastics bottles of a type comprising a star-shaped conveyor located atthe discharge for taking out the bottles and provided with a pluralityof indentations uniformly arranged along the periphery of two spacedapart plates, characterized by the fact vacuum is provided in eachindentation capable of holding and transporting the empty bottle tightlyagainst the indentation surface for a predetermined circumferential arc.5. Machine according to claim 4, characterized by the fact that thestar-shaped conveyor is driven by the same driving means of the aligningand orienting machine.
 6. Machine according to claim 4, characterized bythe fact the star-shaped conveyor has it own driving means independentfrom the machine driving means.